Gifts that Aren't
by angiecat1022
Summary: Mel was just an ordinary girl, until one day, two Gift Users invite her to join a secret community, and, upon discovering she has a Gift, joins the community and discovers there's much more to Gifts than just fun and games.
1. Discovering My Gift

My name is Amelia, but everyone calls me Mel. My friend Claire jokes that it could stand for "Mellow." That's me, quite and easygoing, pleasant. The trouble with being mellow, though, is that it also makes you invisible. As in, no one notices you. It's already October, and each teacher STILL has to ask me what my name is at least twice a week. The record (per month) is twenty-two times.

But all that is about to change, when the first traces of my secret power begin to show up…

It's the twentieth day of October. In exactly one day, twenty-two hours, and forty three minutes, I will turn fourteen. I was born at exactly 7:00 AM on the twenty-second of October. It is currently 8:17 AM. The bus leaves at 8:22, and I'm still at home.

"Mel! Hurry up! The bus leaves in five minutes!"

Yeah. As if I need another freakin' reminder!

I zoom downstairs and grab a banana, only stopping to slip on my flats. I'm running down the corner, backpack in one hand and banana in the other, when I see the bus pull up to the stop. At the same time, my cellphone dings in my pocket. This causes me to stumble.

I can see the bus driver looking at his watch. I pick up my pace, and arrive just as he starts to pull away. He comes to a halt again, and lets me on, annoyed. There are about twenty other kids already on this bus, and I can feel my face start to warm. Luckily, I can see Claire waving at me from the back. I quickly walk down the aisle, conscious that my hair is in my face, and slip in next to her.

She's about to say something, then takes a look at me. Seeing my expression, she opens up her book and starts reading. That's the thing I like about her. If I want to talk, then she will talk with me, but if I want to remain silent, she will too. However, whenever she gets mad, she can hold a grudge for weeks on end, and I have to practically get on my knees and beg for her forgiveness.

The bus arrives at 8:45, twenty minutes before the start of school. I go to my locker, and twist the lock until it opens. As I rummage through the books, a slip of paper falls out of the open door and rests at my feet. I pick it up and unfold it.

Just then, the warning bell rings. I have five minutes before first period, and our Language Arts teacher is NOT very lenient. I quickly gather my things for first, second, and third period and shut the locker door closed. I rush to my seat and plunk my books down at the desk. I look around, and there's no one watching. Good. I open up the piece of paper.

Meet me in the library at 11:50. I know your lunch period starts at 11:45, so no excuses. Tell no one.

CIZ

Huh. Claire's initials are CAM, Claire Alice McAllister, so it couldn't be her. In fact, no one in our class, that I know of, has initials CIZ.

I wonder if I should go when I remember that today's lunch is meatloaf. Ugh. That decides it. Anything is better than the cafeteria's soggy meatloaf.

I sit through first, second, and third period, but I'm itching to see who could want to see me. Finally, the bell rings, and I'm the first one out of my seat. I rush to the cafeteria, ask for a hall pass, using the excuse that I feel like I'm going to throw up, and rush to the library. I arrive just as the clock turns to 11:55.

I hear a male voice whisper, "Psst!" I look to my right, where the sound came from. A boy and a girl who look the about the same age as me are peeking out from the nonfiction section. I hurry over to join them.

"Is one of you CIZ?" I ask.

The boy says, "I'm Matthew, but everyone calls me Matt. I think we have the same science class. I'm not CIZ, she is." He nods to the girl. She looks Asian, with strait black hair and tannish skin. She narrows her almond-shaped eyes at me. "I'm Caroline Iris Zhang. Before you ask, I'm Chinese. The stupid looking blond boy next to me who I call Matthew but everyone calls Matt is half Danish, half Scottish. I'm in the other eighth grade homeroom, so you haven't seen me around."

"Oh come on, I don't look stupid. Do I, Mel?"

Caught off guard, I stammer, "N-no, of course not." Come to think of it, those words weren't a lie. He was pretty good looking, though his ears stuck out way too much. He used to wear glasses, but then he got contacts and got a new haircut, which looks way better on him. He has smallish downturned eyes, so it looked like he was always squinting, but in a good way. He had a longish face (look, I'm not good at describing people, ok?). He was on the pale side, but wasn't what you'd call pale.

Caroline's voice brings me back to the present. "Are you going to stop staring at each other like idiots?" She turns to Matthew, "Are you going to tell her what we're here for?"

"I wasn't staring!" he sputters, but his reddening cheeks and averted glances betray him. Eventually he clears his throat, and states, "We called you here because you have a AGAAC. Short for, "A Gift and a Curse." I must have looked pretty confused, because Caroline nudges him, and he continues, "that's because it's both, in our experiences."

"What are you talking about?" I ask.

"Well, it's basically like the superpowers you read about in books, but much more complicated," the girl says. "The power emerges on your twelfth, thirteenth, or fourteenth birthday. Some of the powers are simple or generic, like flying, invisibility, super speed, etc. Others, like being able to decode any coded message, or to know how many times a person has spoken a certain word just by shaking their hand, are less common."

"So, wait, are you saying that in two days I'll get a… an AGAAC?"

"Basically."

"Do you guys have them?"

"Yes. We do. I can tell you whether you like someone, and how much you like them, and whether you're romantically interested in them, as well as whether anyone likes you, by taking your hands and squeezing them three times. I tried it once. The person wouldn't talk to me for a year."

"Who was it?"

"Matthew." Matthew looks furious, but he restrains from making comments. She continues, "Matt has the stupid and generic power of flying. He can also pick you up and fly you somewhere, if you're light enough."

"Wait, what did you find out about him?"

Now Matthew is twitching and his knuckles have turned white. Caroline smoothly says, "He considers that confidential information, but what I will tell you is -" Unfortunately, I didn't get to find out, because suddenly Matthew tackles her. The librarian looks up to see the cause of all the noise, but luckily a crash is heard from the other side of the library. She hesitates, then heads over there to see all the commotion. I'm relieved, because a chair was blocking the fighting. If she had moved even one inch, she would've been able to see both Matthew and Caroline.

As soon as she is out of earshot, I hiss, "Quit it, you two! She almost came over here!" They unscramble themselves pretty quickly. "So, what is my Gift/Curse?"

"Oh, you won't know what it is until you get it. In fact, no one will. However, from previous experience, you will discover it pretty soon, on your fourteenth birthday."

"How can you tell that I have one?"

"Oh, that's because I've been specially trained. Trust me, you don't want to know the details. Also, you've seen Grayson around, right?" I nod. She continues, "His gift is the ability to sense others with gifts. He's also able to detect your mood at a given moment by making eye contact with you, so make sure you're happy when you see him! He works with us pretty extensively."

"Who else has gifts, besides me, you, Matthew – I mean, Matt, and Grayson?"

She looks thoughtful. "In our school? Brian from the sixth grade, he has the power to guess your age by touching your shoulder, Jackie, also from the sixth grade, she has the power to grow anyone's hair by braiding it and then touching your eyebrows, Kenzie from the seventh grade, who has the power to make paper appear when she touches a pencil – useful if you left your notebook at home, and Walker from the seventh grade, who can turn his eyes any color."

My eyes bug out. "THAT MANY?!" How did I not notice?

She smiles. "It's not obvious. We do our best to hide it. Soon, you will too."

I sigh. It looks like this is going to be a tough year.

The next two days pass by both too fast and too slow, until my alarm sounds at 6:55 AM on my birthday. I groggily sit up, then I remember what today I supposed to be, and I stiffen. The alarm now reads 6:57. I brush my teeth. 6:59. I then spend a minute having a staring contest with my clock until it turns 7:00. Suddenly, a pain so sharp that it causes me to fall to the floor seizes me, and that's where I am when my mom finds me.

"Er, Mel? What are you doing on the floor? And why is your room so messy? Why do you do this every morning?" She says. Except it sounds kind of muffled. Maybe she's speaking into a handkerchief. It also sounds kind of like a robot. Huh. I must be having problems.

"I... was searching for something I dropped. And my room is not messy! I don't do this EVERY morning, just most of them!"

"Huh?" I swivel around to see my mother with her hand on her chin. "Did I ask that out loud? I was sure thought that..." She says in the same staticy voice. Except her mouth's not moving.

"Have you become a ventriloquist or something? And you must've, because I heard you, clear as day..."

"What?!" My mother is shaking now. She calms herself down with a few deep breaths. "Are you all right? Maybe I'm delusional. I haven't had my cup of coffee yet.." Her voice fades as she retreats down the stairs.

I haven't realized it yet, but my hands are shaking. I feel... drained. Is this my AGAAC? Could it be... I CAN READ MINDS?!


	2. A new Character?

I decide to test my theory out. At breakfast, I ask my little sister, Olivia, whether she has a crush on anyone. She says, "No, of course not!" but the staticy voice (it sounds more girly now) says "I used to, on this supercute, superhandsome boy named Tom, but now I don't anymore. OK, I still do. But what can I say?"

I nearly fall over out of my chair, but luckily she's too absorbed in her thoughts to notice. Absorbed in her thoughts. Why can't I hear them now? Maybe I can only hear if I've asked a question.

As I'm boarding the bus later that morning, the bus driver asks me how my day is so far. "Good, nothing much happened," I say, "What about you?"

"Oh, my daughter got the new backpack she ordered a few weeks ago!" Her staticy voice says, "The one SHE made me buy! She didn't even tell me about it, and I didn't notice until it came in the mail!"

Woah! This is like, a superpower. I'm getting honest answers to any question ever! I find Claire. She has been refusing to tell me WHAT is going on with her friend, but now I can find out. "So, any news on your friend?" I ask sweetly.

"No," she answers, but the voice in her head tells me they got into a fight because her friend didn't sign up for theater club like she said she would, and now Claire's all alone.

At this point, I'm feeling a bit guilty. After all, these are everyone's PRIVATE thoughts! So I don't think about my new power until fifth period Science, where I see Matt again. Suddenly, I remember our meeting a couple days back. I've gotten both Caroline and Matt's phone numbers, as well as Grayson's, and Matt's actually SUPER funny. Plus, he's going to be on the track team. Tryouts are in March. I've always liked running, but I've only been in a few competitions.

After fifth period, I find another note in my locker. This time, I'm to meet them at Starbucks after school. They said to bring a notepad and a pencil. Huh. Well, I've already got both of those things in my backpack. I text my mom about it at lunch. She says it's OK, as long as I'm home for dinner. I tell her I will be. I can't wait!

Finally, school's over. I grab my backpack and practically knock the teacher over. The Starbucks is pretty close, and Mom's going to pick me up from Starbucks, so I run the whole way. Before I open the door, however, I smooth my hair and wipe the sweat off my forehead. Running a mile and a half in my school uniform isn't doing my legs any favors!

(Though I think it may have been my fastest time yet… I left school at 3:55 – that's when school ends – and arrived at Starbucks just as the clock turned from 4:06 to 4:07. Twelve minutes isn't too bad for a mile and a half!)

I quickly spotted Caroline, Matt, Grayson, and a few other kids who must've been Brian, Jackie, Kenzie, and Walker sitting around a table, drinks by their sides. One of the boys (was it Brian or Walker?) gave me a quick wave. I waved back, blushing a little bit. He patted the seat next to him, so I took the last remaining seat at the table.

"Hi!" he says with a big grin, "I'm Walker! I take it Caroline has already told you about me and my AGAAC?" I nod, aware of the rising color in my cheeks. I've never been good with boys, not even boys younger than me, such as Walker. He continues, "I found my power on my thirteenth birthday, which was a couple weeks ago. I have better control of my powers now. Wanna see?" When I give him a nod of affirmation, he suddenly switches his eyes from blue to brown, then to green, then to yellow and red and purple. I'm getting dizzy from all the changes. His eyes go back to blue again.

"Sorry if that made you dizzy, it seems to have that effect on people. It'll come in handy when I have a girlfriend!" He must've seen my puzzled look, because he continues, "I have a youtube channel, and I want to do a girlfriend tag. One of the questions will be, 'what color are my eyes?' I can switch my eye color around while I'm shielding my eyes or something, and she'll never be able to guess! Only problem is, no girlfriend, so no tag. But, if you must know, their original color is gray, but they look better blue. What about you?"

"Me? Um, well, I just turned fourteen today, and my power is apparently reading minds, which I think Caroline's going to say is generic. I'm not very good at it, don't worry!" I reassure him as his face starts to go beet red, "It only works when I ask you questions. Geez, you really don't trust me," I say when he plugs his fingers in his ears. "I won't ask you questions." He hesitantly takes his fingers out.

"Alright, everyone!" says Caroline, "we will commence today's meeting. If you haven't gotten your drink yet, too late, you can do that in 30 minutes during our five-minute break. Meeting is over at 5:15, so we have an hour and ten minutes of working ahead of us, and five minutes for you to go pee or whatever."

Wow, she's really bossy!

"First things first, I would like to introduce a new member, Amelia Leila Zimmerman!" How did she get my middle name? She continues, "She just turned fourteen today. She's unidentified, unless you know your power already…?"

"Um, I think it's reading minds."

A collective gasp goes up in the room. Several kids start muttering to themselves, and I see Walker biting his nails. Matt leans back in his chair, apparently at ease. Caroline also remains calm, though I can see her brow furrow.

"Do you know how strong your *cough* generic *cough* power is? And settle down, you know those with Gifts can't use their gifts on other gift users without consent." A few kids quite at this, and out of the corner of my eye I see Walker put his hands in his lap.

"Not very strong. In fact, it only works when I ask someone a question. Then, I hear their response in a staticy voice." I say.

"Oh, so you're not THAT powerful. Still, that is pretty powerful for a beginner. Maybe you'd like to describe how you found out that power?"

"No thanks," I say, thinking back to when I asked my sister who her crush was, "Um, I responded to something my mom thought," I add hastily.

She nods. "That often happens with Gift Users; they tend to find out by accident. Usually it's not that bad, unless the Gift/Curse happens to involve flames, water, or death. But we don't have any of those here. Do we, Grayson? Um, Grayson?"

"Hold on, I think I can sense a new Gift User. And they're far more powerful than any of us." Worried, we all look around the Starbucks. "They're birthday is… a week from now… they're turning fourteen… I think it's… her?" He points to a girl sitting by herself, typing on a laptop and sipping a vanilla bean Frappuccino.

Just then, the girl looks at me. I gasp. She has the weirdest purple eyes, and she's wearing a black dress with poofy sleeves, black tights, and-get this-a corset. She doesn't smile, instead looking away, and I have a feeling someone very powerful is going to come into our lives. (Haha this is an anime reference to Shugo Chara, the girl is very much like Hoshina Utau, very reserved, very powerful.)


	3. Dangerous Talents

"All right, everyone, meeting's over!" Caroline hops down from the chair she was standing on.

I breathe a sigh of relief. We had discussed tactics to hide your Gift, three gift users from the 1970's (apparently we're going decade by decade. The gift users were Muhammad Ali, Stephen Spielberg, and Richard Nixon), and a special lecture just for me, since I had just gotten my Gift. The lecture included ways to control my Gift, the etiquettes of having a gift (no reading minds without permission), and a mini overview of everyone who's ever had a gift.

"I wish Albert were here," Walker sighed.

"Who's Albert?" I asked.

"Oh, right. You don't know him. Albert is in my grade. He's REALLY good at playing the flute, and he's one of my friends."

"Wait, what's his last name?"

"Young."

"Oh, I think I met him from a camp! That was really fun! Hey, do you play an instrument?"

"I play viola."

"Oh, me too! Maybe we-" I was interrupted as Caroline grabbed my arm and pulled me over.

"Sorry, you'll have to excuse us for a second," she told Walker through gritted teeth, and not sounding very sorry at all. She tugged me next to Grayson.

"Ok, Amelia, do you think you're available Saturday at 3:30 pm? We need to go through some training. Grayson and I," at the mention of his name, Grayson looked over, "decided it would be best to give you some extra training, given how powerful you are."

"Oh, um, sure," I stammered, "But how long is it going to be?"

She mulled it over. "Until… 6:30? That's if we're lucky and you do everything you're supposed to, of course."

"THREE HOURS?!"

Caroline smiled wryly. "This takes training, you know. How many people's minds did you read today?"

"Um…" Truth to be told, a lot. I hadn't even realized I was reading my mom's mind. I had read my mom's mind, my sister's, the bus driver's, Claire's, and Henry, a boy in my grade who refused to tell me what he had been doing last night after he hadn't handed in his research on Incan religion.

"I thought so. Plus, we need to nurture your power and help you grow stronger, while at the same time making sure that you're able to restrain it and possibly eliminate it for short periods of time. We also need to teach you more about the history of gifts and yours in particular, as well as how to block your mind from others and how to probe into another Gift User's mind."

My head was swimming from all that information, but I managed a weak nod. She continued, "Also, could you be on the lookout for other gift users? And do you know that girl over there?" She motions to the purple-eyed blond girl in the corset.

"Nope," I declared. She sipped at her drink, then looked over at me again. This time, she narrows her eyes. A sharp burst of pain travelled through my mind, if only for a second. I grab onto a chair to keep from crumpling to the ground. Unfortunately, that chair happens to be Grayson's. Worse, I see out of the corner of my eye he's struggling to sit up straight too. He grabs Caroline's chair, and Caroline grabs the table. We tip for a second, then all twelve legs of our three chairs settle on the ground.

Grayson touches his head, then winces. "I've never felt anything like that before," he says.

Caroline seems unaffected. "Did she look at you?" I ask.

"Nope," Caroline says, "though she might as well have done so, judging from the spectacle we made."

Grayson ignores the comment. "That was the most pain I've felt since… since never," he says, "her power may be kicking in a bit early, gradually worming it's way to its full potential. And I think I know what her power is."

"What?" Caroline says.

"Her power… is to dull other's Gifts," Grayson whispers.

"No! Impossible!" shouts Caroline. Several people from the next table look at us. Unfazed, Caroline goes on, "we haven't had one of those in almost seventy years! And why now, of all times?"

"Shhhh!" both Grayson and I chorus. She glares at each of us, then continues, "Since you don't know, Amelia, that girl has the power to weaken or even kill your gift altogether. Her kind are very rare, and the last one caused unthinkable damage. We don't speak their names," she added as I opened my mouth to ask what their name was. She continues, "Their kind have a special name, too. They're the Killers. And you don't want one of them against you, believe me. As well as being able to Kill your gift, they can freeze you in place with a snap of their fingers. Some can even cause your spirit to leave you. Those are rare, and it's lucky we caught her early, so we can condition her."

A wave of fear goes through me, and I look at the girl again. I scoot my chair away from her, then I stop. "Hey, shouldn't we go over to her then?"

"Yes, I suppose," Caroline admits. All three of us begin to rise out of our chairs when Caroline tells me to sit back down.

"You can't go. You're a newcomer."

"So? I have the right to meet her. Besides, you said yourself she can't kill me."

"That doesn't mean it's safe," Caroline argues. "If she's angered, we don't know what she could do."

Grayson touches her shoulder. "Just let her go," he says. She hesitates, looking into his eyes. He seems to give her some sort of message, and she sighs.

"All right, you can come," she says, "but make sure whatever you do, you don't make eye contact with her, ok?"

"OK!" I say, eager to get moving and to see what's going to happen. The three of us approach her. As we're walking to the table, however, she gets up to leave, closing her computer and draining the last of her Frappucino. We hurry to catch up to her, and Caroline grabs her arm just in time.

She spins around faster than I would've thought possible. "What?" she snaps.

Caroline stares back into her eyes. I can see her gaze waiver, but it's only for a second as she hardens again, "You have a gift. And I'm pretty sure you know it."

The girl says nothing, and for a second I'm afraid she's going to leave. Suddenly, she begins to narrow her eyes, and Caroline quickly averts her gaze, pretending to scratch her nose. "What's it to you?" she asks quietly. "Yes, I realized there was something different about me. It keeps on giving me headaches."

"Well, we're here to help," Caroline says softly. The two girls stare at each other, each seeing something in the other's eyes. Finally, the purple-eyed girl relents.

"OK. What do I have to do?" she asks.

"Well, first off, what's your name?" I blurt out, unable to stop my elf. She turns to stare at me, and I quickly feign a coughing fit. I was not about to experience that pain again!

"Crystal." She looks as if she has trouble even forcing the word out and telling me her name.

"Well, Crys, do you – " Crystal interrupts Caroline by pulling away.

"It's Crystal. No nicknames. And meet me at the creek down by your school tomorrow at 4:00." She pulls away from Caroline, and with a jingle of the bell over the door, she was gone.


End file.
